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CWU Athletic Hall of Fame Class of 2013 Announced

ELLENSBURG, Wash. (March 18, 2013) — The selections have been made for the next class of inductees into the Central Washington University Athletic Hall of Fame. This year’s banquet and induction ceremony, which is open to the public, will be held Saturday, May 18, in Nicholson Pavilion on the Ellensburg campus.

A social hour is scheduled for 5:00 to 6:00 p.m., with the banquet and ceremony to follow. Tickets are $35 and are available online at www.mycentral.cwu.edu/hof or by calling 509-963-1959.

The 30th anniversary class will include:

• Paul Harshman, who ran on both the CWU cross country and track and field teams between 1979-84. He still holds CWU’s 3,000 and 10,000-meter records, and ranks second all-time in 5,000 meters and tenth in the 1,500 meters. He placed third in the 10,000 to earn All-American honors at the 1984 National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) national meet. In addition, he took seventh in the 5,000 in 1984 and 11th in the 10,000 at the 1982 national meet. Harshman also led the Wildcats to four consecutive top-10 finishes at the NAIA national cross country meet. After completing his college career, he continued running, placing second in the 1992 Seattle Marathon and seventh in the 1995 Portland Marathon. Harshman has been a teacher and music director for the past 25 years. His jazz ensembles have been considered among the finest in the nation since the early 1990s.

• Katie (Orgill) Hinckley was a standout volleyball outside hitter from 1998-2001. She recorded 951 kills as a Wildcat, which still ranks eighth in school history, and her 1,222 digs, the school record until 2009, is still CWU’s second best all-time mark and among the top 20 totals in Great Northwest Athletic Conference (GNAC) history. Orgill was an all-league GNAC selection as a senior, following being a Pacific West Conference all-star as a junior. As a health education major, she was also a three-time All-Academic selection, twice in the PacWest and once in the GNAC. As the head volleyball coach at Yakima’s West Valley High School, she led the Rams to the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association Class 3A state title in 2011 and Class 2A title in 2012. Her team also placed third in the state 3A ranks in 2010.

• Jan (Harriman) Schuerman was one of the pioneers in women’s track and field at Central. In 1970, she became the first female pentathlete and the first to use the high-jump technique known as the "Fosbury Flop.” In addition, she competed in the hurdles, high jump, and on Central’s record-setting 4x100 yard relay team that set and held the Northwest Conference’s record time. Competing for CWU between 1968-71, she qualified for the 1970 women’s national intercollegiate track and field meet at the University of Illinois, where she placed eighth in high jump. She paid her own way to the event, in an era when there was just one collegiate division. Since ending her Central career, she has coached track and field, gymnastics, and softball, and served as a high school gymnastics judge. She also the founded the North Side Sports Association for girls in Spokane.

• Theartis Wallace, men’s basketball, played two seasons, 1968-69, at CWU. He averaged 12.5 points, leading the Wildcats in scoring average as a senior, and grabbed 255 rebounds during his career. In 1969, Wallace was named to the NAIA All-American first team as he led the Wildcats to a 24-9 record and third place finish at the NAIA national tournament. The Seattle SuperSonics selected him in the eighth round of the 1969 National Basketball Association draft. Wallace was a 1962 first team all-state basketball player at Richland High School, where he was also inducted into its Hall of Fame, and a 1965 Northwest Athletic Association of Community Colleges all-tournament player for Columbia Basin College. Wallace also participated in tennis tournaments throughout the Northwest and was ranked by the United States Tennis Association. He died in 2011.

• The 2002 CWU football team completed an unbeaten regular season, ending the year with an 11-1 mark. Among the season’s highlights, the Wildcats pummeled perennial NCAA Division II powerhouse University of North Dakota 43-7 in Grand Forks, North Dakota; defeated Montana State University, an NCAA Division I FCS school, in Bozeman, Montana 31-16; claimed the Cascade Cup with a 35-28 overtime victory over Western Washington University. The team was led by quarterback Zak Hill, who threw for better than 299-yards-per-game, wide receiver Brian Potucek, who caught 86 passes for 1,265 yards, running back Willie Johnson, who rushed for 929 yards and 18 touchdowns, and linebacker Blake Walker, who recorded 91 tackles. Ellensburg High graduate Levi Teasley was also a starting linebacker for that team, and ended the year with 65 tackles, which was third best that year.

With the addition of these individuals and team, the CWU Athletics Hall of Fame will have a total of 170 individuals and 15 teams that have been inducted since the inaugural class in 1983.